Defeating Terrorism Abroad and at Home

If you have done so, I urge you to watch the video below in its entirety.

President Obama’s Address to the United Nations

The following comments apply specifically to the section that begins at or very near the 15:50 mark.

A thoughtful reader will recognize that the arguments President Obama makes are substantive and sane.

Those who hate President Obama will, of course, see this address as an opportunity to disregard the substance and wisdom and instead to attack him as a Muslim apologist. In so doing they will ignore the following inconvenient facts:

1. General Martin Dempsey made essentially the same argument when he addressed the Senate Armed Services Committee on September 16, saying: “ISIL will ultimately be defeated when their cloak of religious legitimacy is stripped away and the populations on which they have imposed themselves reject them.”
2. What Mr. Obama says about Muslim terrorists applies to all who hide behind religion to preach fear, hatred, and violence.
3. Just as ISIL perverts Islam to justify it's actions they pervert Christianity in order to justify their hatred. Both, of course, wish to wield absolute power over others.

President Obama's remarks challenge all people as individuals to confront and defeat the primary source and nurturer of terrorism -  ignorance based on hatred of the dreaded other.

Any lesser strategy is essentially the same as putting a used band-aid on a festering wound.

* * *

Followup Article: Why Obama Is Planning To Use Religion To Fight ISIS.
Think Progress offers an excellent examination of Mr. Obama's strategy. It's short and worth reading.

Click here to read it.